Best Tent Camping near Purcellville, VA
Tent camping near Purcellville, Virginia includes several established campgrounds and primitive sites within an hour's drive. Sky Meadows State Park Campground offers a popular backcountry tent camping experience about 15 miles southwest of town, while Antietam Creek Campground in the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park provides riverside tent sites to the north.
Most tent campsites in the region require some effort to access, with many designated as hike-in or walk-in only. Sky Meadows features a one-mile hike to reach its wooded tent sites, each equipped with a bear box, fire ring, picnic table, and tent pad with pea gravel. Antietam Creek requires campers to park on the street and walk across a bridge to reach riverside sites. Vault toilets or pit toilets are common, though many locations lack running water. A camper noted, "There is nowhere to leave trash, so be sure to follow Leave No Trace principles and pack everything out with you."
The tent camping experience in this region offers varying levels of seclusion and natural settings. Sky Meadows provides wooded sites dispersed throughout hills, creating private tent camping areas despite the campground being full. Sites at Antietam Creek sit along the Potomac River with limited privacy between neighbors and the C&O towpath. A recent review mentioned, "The sites are fully or mostly shaded. Be prepared to make friends with bugs, but they shouldn't bother you." For more remote primitive tent setups, Little Crease Shelter offers a secluded backcountry experience about a mile and a half from Veach Gap Trailhead. Many locations throughout the region provide access to extensive trail networks, including sections of the Appalachian Trail, making them ideal bases for day hiking or backpacking adventures.